Clouded vision - suspicions of a psychic

My wife just left for the day to meet John Edward, the chipmunk-faced psychic and author of Crossing Over.

Hey, I’m psychic too and can tell what the future holds! I can predict that I will raise holy hell in the next two weeks when the credit card statement shows me how much I got robbed for this bill of goods yer man is selling!

I am suspicious of John Edward. He targets poor women like my mother-in-law, who dragged my wife to this “Saturday private viewing” event at great expense in a frantic attempt to connect with the great man that cancer ripped from our grasp so prematurely.

“I’m not going to come through to you through the mouth of that crook,” my wife’s lanky father Richard will yell out to his daughter from a cloud during this psychic reading, ruffling a copy of today’s New York Times as he crosses his long legs on the recliner.

I know Edward would never get a read on me because I am closed off to the possibility of such nonsense. But if I were open to it, I would direct his attention to a cloud next to Richard, where my grandmothers would meet for their daily tea. They got on well during their time on Earth, and I would hope this friendship would continue in these greener pastures.

“‘Tis a nice girlene that Michael Joe married,” my Granny Farragher would lean over and say to Granny Cleary about my wife as she scanned the event with her intense blue eyes. “Pity the poor thing is gullible enough to fork over my grandson’s money to this tinker.”

“Yerra, Barbara is a dote,” my Granny Cleary would chirp with a high voice. “Can yeh believe our Michael Joseph is coming out with a second book, This Is Your Brain on Shamrocks, available on Kindles and online this February?”

Granny Cleary was always my biggest fan and would have definitely dropped that plug into a conversation! Besides, this is my psychic reading. Back off!

“There was always something about that boy all right, he never missed a trick when he came into my parlor,” Granny Farragher might say, her wrinkled thumbs circling the rim on the mug of tea.

“I should have known he’d be cataloguing all of that detail for a book someday. Mind yeh, he could take off some weight, sure, he’s as big as a house.”

“Oh, right,” Granny Farragher might say with a nod, the eyebrows dancing above her thick bifocals momentarily. She’d be discreet enough to bring the mug of tea up to her face to hide the protruding tongue in her cheek. “Yeh sure yeh have enough butter on that scone, pet?”

“The lad and his brother turned out fine, sure! Stop mothering them already! Michael’s got a great girl, they’re doing a stellar job raising daughters, but still she has to nitpick about every little thing.

“Mass attendance. If they are wearing warm clothes. The fact that the pathway he shoveled in the snow is too narrow. What the neighbors think about the gaudy inflatable Christmas decorations still buried on the front lawn under all that snow.

“Can yeh believe it? She runs around that house all day long worrying herself sick about these little things -- imagine the state of her if her kids had real problems? Now she has me pacing the clouds about her! I hope she doesn’t wind herself into an early grave with shot nerves!”

“‘Tis a mystery where she got that trait from, missus,” came Granny Farragher’s cool reply. “No idea a’tall, sure. Anyway, not a bother. Your Eileen will bury them all down there, fair play to her.” “I suppose,” she would say.

Granny Cleary would stand up, press the wrinkles out of her flowered dress with her hand, and walk over to the edge of the cloud.

“John, if ye can hear me, have Barbara tell Eileen, Mick, and the kids we love them and can’t wait to see them!”

“But not too soon, mind yeh, there’ll be time enough for that,” Granny Farragher might say from the table.

“Let’s say a prayer that they’re all up here an hour before the ‘divil’ knows they’re dead. Now, come on, missus, the tea is getting cold. Don’t pay no mind to that eejit down there.”